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Press release:
São Paulo, 28th of February.
The São Paulo-based (Brazil) award-winning Brazilian indie XR developer and publisher ARVORE, are today very proud and happy to announce that they are soon going to release the new mixed reality mode (“YUKI MRcade”) for their bullet-hell/roguelike VR game “YUKI” (the new mixed reality mode works as an as a free expansion for the main game).

Thanks to a partnership with HTC VIVE, this new mode will be showcased at the upcoming SXSW Festival 2023 (Booth 201, see location details below) running on the cutting-edge HTC VIVE XR Elite headset. YUKI is a VR game where you will use your hands and body to battle your way against fierce enemies, blending two popular genres: bullet hell and roguelike. Holding a toy action-figure, fly through a kid’s imagination and dodge an infinite barrage of bullets through amazing environments… With YUKI MRcade, all those enemies will be invading your own house!

The brand new Mixed Reality mode takes the YUKI experience to the next level. With this free update, you can bring the fantastical world of YUKI into your own living space, using your own hands and body to battle fierce enemies in real time. Imagine the thrill of seeing virtual portals open up in your living room, and enemies emerge, ready to attack. The Mixed Reality update introduces a completely new gameplay mode to YUKI with a redesigned gameplay, new enemies and challenges.

“YUKI’s MRcade Mode is a dream come true to our dev team. Since day one back in 2020, we always wanted to somehow explore a 360 gameplay. We knew it would be a complete different experience, with new creative challenges in every aspect of the game.

When we had the green light to create the Mixed Reality mode we knew what to do and the result goes way beyond what everyone expected in many levels. It’s a complete new approach to YUKI, a new way to explore your room and your awareness. I’m sure YUKI and XR players will have an amazing experience” – Kako, YUKI’s Creative Director

The 3 Main Challenges in the Creation of YUKI MRcade

This mixed reality adaptation YUKI MRcade was an exciting opportunity to experience completely new design challenges that came from translating an existing VR gameplay into Mixed Reality. The ARVORE team had to rethink and explore several design areas to create a new a fun and engaging experience that they hope players will enjoy:

Translating the Universe to MR – In keeping with the game’s core fantasy, the team kept the original theme and adapted game elements to fit the new and reimagining ones.This allowed players to immerse themselves in the game’s story, identify elements they were already familiar with, and explore the world in new and exciting ways. The game had to still feel like YUKI, but fit within each user’s home and space that was now a new dimension of the game.

User Interface – For this new mode, the user interface has been totally redesigned, ensuring that players could easily understand the information on the screen while moving around in physical space. Readability and understanding were fundamental to the success of the game and, therefore, the development team invested in an intuitive and clean interface which also had to exist and work within the mixed reality context of the user’s own space.

Spatial Exploration – Another important challenge was adding a new spatial dimension to the game, allowing users to play in 360 degrees around their own real space.

This is a big design change from the “on-rails” design of the base YUKI VR game, and many considerations had to be made here, including player safety. It was essential that players could play safely while avoiding collisions with objects and other people in the real world. Everything has been designed with that in mind, from enemy positioning, fair 360 exploration, challenge construction, and bullet design and movement.

SXSW and YUKI’s Booth Location & Date

– Press and Industry day: Saturday, March 11 from 2 – 6pm.

– Public exhibition XR Experience: Sunday, March 12 until Tuesday, March 14. Opening hours will be 11am – 6pm daily in the Fairmont Austin in the Congressional ballroom (3rd floor).

Booth number: 201, see map here: LINK MAP SXSW
Selection: XR Experience Spotlight
Site: https://schedule.sxsw.com/2023/films/2079211
Address: 101 Red River St, Austin, TX 78701, USA LINK

YUKI is an upbeat mix of the bullet-hell and roguelike genres in VR set in a multidimensional anime universe. Enter a kid’s wild imagination and fly by controlling Yuki’s action-figure using your hands. Move your body to dodge bullets and obstacles, while fighting evil forces that want to control the universe, in this challenging game where each defeat is just another step to get closer to victory.

Through its unique VR gameplay, adding twists to the inspirational gameplay of old-school classics like STAR FOX, YUKI challenges the player’s spatial awareness and precise reflexes across multiple levels, each filled to the brim with procedurally placed enemies, obstacles, and bullets. Roguelite elements — such as a persistent progression system that allows the player to improve his skills by equipping several power ups, new abilities and weapons at the beginning and during each run — raise the stakes and makes the player want to come back for more and try new evolving strategies to beat the game.
An In-depth look at YUKI’s Mechanics

YUKI offers a unique VR blend of the Bullet Hell and Roguelike genres. Both genres are known for their high difficulty, but YUKI is designed to be accessible and enjoyable by everyone. By starting as a “pick up and play” experience, it quickly grows into a very challenging and strategic game, where the player will feel their power progression through a workshop where they can upgrade their action-figure to face the increasing challenges.

As they sharpen their skills against hordes of enemies and challenging boss fights, each run will get the player closer towards victory, while unlocking new Bladewing weapons for Yuki and more and more power-ups. ARVORE wants to invite all players interested in knowing more about YUKI to join their community on Discord and follow the game on Twitter.

ABOUT ARVORE
ARVORE is an Emmy Award-winning Brazilian studio based in São Paulo and Los Angeles that creates and develops games and interactive narrative experiences using the latest immersive technologies such as Virtual Reality, Augmented Reality and Mixed Reality. With a multidisciplinary team of innovators and trailblazers, ARVORE connects different technologies, senses and media to push the envelope of games and storytelling to new levels.

ARVORE launched the acclaimed Pixel Ripped series in 2018 with the VR title “Pixel Ripped 1989”, followed by “Pixel Ripped 1995” last year. The studio recently won the 2020 Primetime Emmy Award for “Outstanding Innovation in Interactive Media” for its interactive VR Narrative “The Line”.

Follow ARVORE on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.